Academic recognition of metal possible

We have made contact with a professor in the University of Texas library system, which has a 200,000 record archive of popular music recordings. They are kept under museum conditions in a climate/humidity controlled building on the UT Austin campus, and digital copies are made of each recording so they are available to academics.

They lack death metal and black metal, but they keep any other kind of underground, ethnic, mainstream or classical music. They need you to send them original recordings of death metal and black metal, especially rarities which will be kept in perpetuity in a safe environment.

Well, thanks to Thamuz's post about the good deals on "Speckmann Project" CDs, I'm going to buy a copy of that album on Amazon. I could, however, buy two copies and send one to Dr. Hunter...unless someone is already in the process of sending that particular album. If not, I'd be more than willing to buy the two copies. Feel free to tell me if anyone is already sending that cd, otherwise I'll order the two at the end of the day.

chrstphrbnntt

Have me down for that one. As soon as I sell this extra tuba I have, I'll have some excess cash and will be able to buy more. If I end up with an extra few thousand dollars I could use a fraction of it to help the cause.

I am curious, do they absolutely need original copies? Is the purpose to preserve the entire piece (ie. artwork and recording medium) or just the music itself? Obviously, original copies are preferable for LP's but CD-R duplicates of CD's are a different breed.

If copies were sufficient, then literally thousands of recordings are available from just members of this board alone at nearly no cost (no cost means people would be more likely to contribute). On the other hand, I suppose copyright issues become involved.

I am curious, do they absolutely need original copies? Is the purpose to preserve the entire piece (ie. artwork and recording medium) or just the music itself? Obviously, original copies are preferable for LP's but CD-R duplicates of CD's are a different breed.

If copies were sufficient, then literally thousands of recordings are available from just members of this board alone at nearly no cost (no cost means people would be more likely to contribute). On the other hand, I suppose copyright issues become involved.

As far as I can tell most of the digital media in their catalog is available for check-out, so that is one reason. Also, even though there are probably copyright issues as far as receiving material goes they probably have more liberty with intellectual property as an academic institution - it looks like they are making their own digital copies as it is. I'm curious about their methods of preservation.

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Vajra

On a related note, I was thinking about sending in At The Gates - The Red... but the latest Peaceville digipak re-issue doesn't have a lyrics booklet (or fold out). With something like this, would it be best to have an older pressing sent with full lyrics available?

- Records are stored in a separate building from the main library. It is climate controlled.

- They are kept on shelves in protective packaging (plastic, inserts removed from acid-producing papers) until needed.

- When needed, they are taken down by a research librarian, copied to digital form and then the digital copy is sent on. The student/faculty never touch the actual object.

- For CDs, the methods are simpler as they can be directly copied. LPs get the most care as they are older and more likely to flake, but if the CD is fragile it will be protected.

Their annual budget is in the tens of millions and they've been doing this since the 1940s, so I think it's a safe place to send. Although I think UT is a glorified high school, you can get a good education there and their graduate departments are often excellent. This is a good place for metal to make it into the academic stream.

I routinely find excellent death metal and black metal CDs on sale or in used racks, and always want to buy another copy because I like the CD so much. Now, I'm going to buy and ship it to Dr. Hunter so he can archive it.

I'm including this:

If you right-click, save as..., it will be in full size (300 dpi) so when you print it it will be the right size.

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Should we send DLA reviews with them (if applicable to the album)?

That's a good idea. I'll start doing that too. It might be an even better way of "branding" these as part of a real metal movement.

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The collection contains more than 300,000 musical recordings, including archival material related to Texas symphonies, classical radio stations and contemporary composers.